Then, Popovich cued up the film from a game in which the Spurs made 20 of 30 3-pointers, swiped 17 steals and once led by 46 — and proceeded to point out all their mistakes.

“No matter if we win by 30 or lose by 30, he can always find something for us to improve,” guard Danny Green said.

It turns out Popovich was right about the Spurs being unable to repeat such a lopsided victory over Dallas. In Sunday's rematch at the American Airlines Center, the Spurs only won by 25.

Behind another power-packed performance from their Big Three, the Spurs whacked the Mavericks 111-86, sending their Interstate-35 rivals spiraling to their sixth straight defeat.

“It's never easy to play a team we beat pretty bad last week,” said point guard Tony Parker, who had 21 points and nine assists Sunday. “Pop talked a lot about focus and making sure we match their energy. That's what we did from the get-go.”

Manu Ginobili supplied 20 points off the bench for the Spurs, while Tim Duncan stacked up another ho-hum double-double with 18 points and 10 rebounds to go with three blocks.

Those two combined with Parker to hand the Spurs (24-8) a five-game winning streak heading into tonight's New Year's Eve game against Brooklyn at the AT&T Center.

“We knew it was going to be a tough game,” said Ginobili, who has notched back-to-back 20-point games for the first time this season. “We had to have a great approach from Minute 1, and it worked.”

With Dirk Nowitzki still laboring to regain his All-Star form after missing the season's first 27 games recovering from knee surgery, the Mavericks fell to 12-19.

It marks the first time they have been so far under .500 since April 2000, Nowitzki's second season. Dallas finished the month 5-10, its worst December since 1999.

Nowitzki played his fourth game of the season and looked as out of sync as in his first three. He had eight points on 3-of-9 shooting, including a horrendous airball on his lone 3-point attempt.

Nowitzki's struggles were only part of the reason the Mavericks shot 40 percent, including a 1 of 16 mark from 3-point range.

Even with Nowitzki still on the mend, the Spurs arrived at the gym wary of a Dallas team they feared would be in the mood for payback.

Nothing in the NBA, they said, is ever that easy twice.

“We've got to come out and respect these guys and play it all the way through, not expecting to blow them out,” Duncan said after the morning shootaround.

A week after allowing the Spurs to set a franchise record for 3-point shooting at their expense, the Mavs did a better job of running the Spurs off the arc, at least in the first half.

Limited to just 3 of 8 from 3-point range in the opening quarters, the Spurs got much of their offense via mid-range jumpers from Parker and Duncan, garnished with the occasional pick-and-roll basket for Tiago Splitter, who had 13 points.

Though the Spurs never trailed, Dallas at least made them break a sweat for three quarters. When Elton Brand made a put-back basket with 54.6 seconds left in the third, the Mavericks were still within 77-70.

“They were in the game all night,” Popovich said.

Once the Spurs heated up from distance in the second half, finishing 8 of 19, the rout redux was on.

Ginobili had a pair of 3-pointers, and Boris Diaw and Stephen Jackson each hit one as the Spurs pushed their lead to 98-80 heading into the final five minutes.

Having called their coach's bluff, beating the Mavs twice by a combined 63 points in the span of a week, the Spurs all but dared Popovich to nit-pick another game film.

He appears to be up to the challenge.

“Coaches are never happy,” Popovich said. “Happy is not a word in the vocabulary.”